| The IDL Book Bidness [message #33201] |
Thu, 12 December 2002 08:33  |
David Fanning
Messages: 11724
Registered: August 2001
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Senior Member |
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Folks,
Last night I was deep into spline functions and becoming
confused when I suddenly thought "Screw it, this seems too
much like work!"
The thought suddenly triggered memories of writing my first
book, almost exactly five years ago now. I remember finishing
and writing the forward at 7PM on Christmas Eve night. No
presents purchased. No thought to the season. Just one goal
in mind: finish that &!*%$ book!
In all those years, I have never counted up how many
books I sold. I did last night. Are you sitting down?
4365
Wow! I had 1000 covers printed for the First Edition and
I remember thinking, "Now *that* was a waste of good money!"
You can make up the numbers yourself, but I can assure
you that book has allowed me to spend a lot of time here
on the newsgroup swapping lies rather than looking for
gainful employment. :-)
In a time when it is appropriate to count your blessings,
I just want to say again how much I appreciate everyone
in the IDL community who has made it possible to make
a living doing something I love. Thanks to all of you.
Best Regards,
David
P.S. Let's just say that when I showed the numbers to my
wife I suddenly learned that I would be writing *another*
book real soon now. :-(
--
David W. Fanning, Ph.D.
Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
Phone: 970-221-0438, E-mail: david@dfanning.com
Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming: http://www.dfanning.com/
Toll-Free IDL Book Orders: 1-888-461-0155
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| Re: The IDL Book Bidness [message #33409 is a reply to message #33201] |
Thu, 19 December 2002 20:03  |
David Fanning
Messages: 11724
Registered: August 2001
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Senior Member |
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Pete Riley (uk2@email.com) writes:
> And this isn't counting the countless photocopies!
Yeah, tell me about it. :-(
But I've also heard of a lot of good people, too,
standing up to say it was the wrong thing to do.
I've always thought that what goes along, comes
along. We'll just have to see.
Cheers,
David
P.S. If anyone is feeling particularly guilty though,
this would be a good time to make amends. Dave Burridge
and I are just finishing a big year-long project and
we have a dynamite object-oriented widget library we
want to put to use building imaging applications.
Think extendable, re-useable code, professionally
written with humor and wisecracks thrown in for free. :-)
--
David W. Fanning, Ph.D.
Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
Phone: 970-221-0438, E-mail: david@dfanning.com
Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming: http://www.dfanning.com/
Toll-Free IDL Book Orders: 1-888-461-0155
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| Re: The IDL Book Bidness [message #33410 is a reply to message #33201] |
Thu, 19 December 2002 19:44 |
Pete Riley
Messages: 3
Registered: April 2002
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Junior Member |
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And this isn't counting the countless photocopies!
In article <MPG.18624f9951044f28989a62@news.frii.com>, David Fanning
<david@dfanning.com> wrote:
> Folks,
>
> Last night I was deep into spline functions and becoming
> confused when I suddenly thought "Screw it, this seems too
> much like work!"
>
> The thought suddenly triggered memories of writing my first
> book, almost exactly five years ago now. I remember finishing
> and writing the forward at 7PM on Christmas Eve night. No
> presents purchased. No thought to the season. Just one goal
> in mind: finish that &!*%$ book!
>
> In all those years, I have never counted up how many
> books I sold. I did last night. Are you sitting down?
>
> 4365
>
> Wow! I had 1000 covers printed for the First Edition and
> I remember thinking, "Now *that* was a waste of good money!"
>
> You can make up the numbers yourself, but I can assure
> you that book has allowed me to spend a lot of time here
> on the newsgroup swapping lies rather than looking for
> gainful employment. :-)
>
> In a time when it is appropriate to count your blessings,
> I just want to say again how much I appreciate everyone
> in the IDL community who has made it possible to make
> a living doing something I love. Thanks to all of you.
>
> Best Regards,
>
> David
>
> P.S. Let's just say that when I showed the numbers to my
> wife I suddenly learned that I would be writing *another*
> book real soon now. :-(
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